Always the Last to Know

Chapter 25

It was a
total relief when Lester assured me that he wouldn’t breathe a word of what I’d
just blurted to anyone, but at the same time I worried about how he would treat
me now that he knew the truth. Would it help or hinder our relationship?
Clearly, he’d harboured a lot of resentment toward me, between the feelings
he’d tamped down on for years and my sudden disappearance which, according to
Tank, lead to a failed marriage – details on that are pending, since he refused
to tell me anymore, insisting that Lester would explain if he wanted me to know
– and now my equally sudden reappearance.
I was surprised he could even look at me after all the pain I’d inadvertently
caused him.

And now
I’d told him the one thing I’d kept hidden from the entire world. I’d reopened
the wound I’d forced to heal and was baring it to him in the hopes that he
wouldn’t stab it.

“No more
than you want to talk about your unacted-on feelings,” I assured him, wiping
the last of my tears from my face. They were still stinging behind my eyes, but
I wasn’t going to let them fall. The feeling was familiar. How many times had I
denied myself the comfort of crying over the last six years? I refused to cry
about it. Crying didn’t solve anything. What it did was make me puffy faced,
bleary eyed and snot nosed, all things I could do without. “Can we get back to
my lesson?”

“Of
course.”

Apparently
just as eager to get off the sensitive and – on my part, at least – emotional
topic as I was, he quickly grabbed me in the same hold he had almost three week
ago. He didn’t grip as tightly and there was a definite lack of the menacing
tension there had been the first time around. It made me wonder what had been
running through his head that day that he could even fathom handling a woman
like that. The Lester I’d known six years ago would never had laid an injuring
hand to a woman.

Unless
they deserved it.

Had I
deserved it? He may not have been in the know back then, but I had been, and a
part of me had felt that his actions were warranted. I’d been expecting anger
and disappointment, and I’d finally gotten it. Yes, it had hurt, but I’d hurt
him and any number of the men in the building six years ago. His renewed
gentleness irked me more than it should have.

“I’m not
some delicate flower,” I informed him after a moment of waiting for the real
grip to kick in. “I’m the same person I was three weeks ago, treat me like it.”

“I’m not
going to manhandling you like that again,” he said, pain and guilt clear in his
voice. What I wouldn’t give to see his eyes at that moment. Would he give
anything away? Or would I be faced with the same blankness that had plagued me
for weeks. I needed to understand him so I could ease all this turmoil. “I
couldn’t live with myself.”

I tried
to turn in his hold to face him, so he’d see how much I meant my words, but his
grip was firm enough to prevent me from doing so. “I said I didn’t want to be
pitied,” I reminded him sternly. “That includes by you.”

“I don’t
pity you,” he informed me, a hardness creeping into his tone once more. “I just
don’t want to hurt you anymore.”

“But
I-.”

I felt
him shake his head. “You don’t deserve it. No one deserves to be hurt
unnecessarily.”

“I hurt
you unnecessarily,” I pointed out.

“Yes you
did,” he said, cutting me off before I could add anything else. “And I didn’t
deserve it. Now accept that I’m not going treat you like the scum on the streets,
and talk me through how you’re going to get out of this.”

We spent
the next twenty minutes working through step by step how to escape the hold and
disable my attacker long enough to get away. Nothing was said by either of us
that wasn’t absolutely necessary for the process. It’s like we flipped a switch
on all our issues and sent them plummeting through a trap door. Fences and
bridges were far from mended between us, but for the moment, we’d eliminated
them from the equation, tunnelling underground to avoid the wide spread debris.

I began
to sense a shift in Lester’s headspace, however, as he grabbed me again in the
same hold so I could put all my practice and instructions into use.

“When
was it?” he asked quietly by my ear, adjusting the hold so that the first step
he’d taught me would do absolutely nothing in aiding my bid for freedom.

“What?”
I asked, confused by the sudden question.

“You
miscarriage,” he said. “When was it?”

“I told
you I don’t want to talk about it,” I sighed, attempting to wiggle into our previous
positions.

“Do you
know who the baby’s father would have been?” he asked instead, like that was a
preferable line of conversation. I jerked my arms as I had in our first session,
desperate to be out of the same vicinity as Lester and his probing questions.
I’d blurted the reason for my leaving, but only because I couldn’t stand the
way he was describing my life before. I was in no way ready to discuss the
finer points of the situation with him. Not when I was beginning to feel that
tension building in him again, tightening around wrists.

I knew
it was too much to ask that he forgive and forget.

“I need
details, he implored, dragging me more firmly against his chest. “You can’t
just drop a bombshell like that and not expect me to turn it over in my mind. I
want to understand. So much about you leaving has been a mystery for so long.
Now that I know the supposed reason you left, I have more questions than ever.
I just need closure.”

“Closure?”
I questioned. “I’m not dead. Can’t that be closure enough?”

“You
tell me; did running to Mexico fill your closure quota?”

And just
like that, it was hard to breathe again. I don’t know what I’d expected from
Lester after revealing the truth to him, but it certainly wasn’t the same
callous disregard for my feelings he’d shown me for the last three weeks. He
definitely wasn’t treating me like a delicate flower now.

“Let me
go,” I demanded, redoubling my efforts to wriggle free as the tears welled in
my eyes once more. I’d completely ballsed up this entire situation. I should
never have allowed Tank to talk me into this. Coming back had done more harm
than good, to me and to my friends – if I could still call Lester my friend...

“Not
until you learn to get out of the hold,” Lester said mildly.

“Let.
Me. Go. NOW!” I seethed, somehow wrenching my arms out of his hold as I spun to
face him. I wasted no time standing around waiting for him to say something
else to get under my skin, instead hefted my knee into his crotch and walked
away to the sounds of his groans.

*o*

“I saw
you in the gym this morning,,” Hal said by way of greeting as he paused in the
entry of my little cubicle. “Lester’s been giving you a hard time, huh?”

I shook
my head, not so much in denial as in disbelief that things could have gotten so
bad between us. Though I’d denied our closes when Tank had pointed it out,
there was no denying that Lester and I used to be two peas in a pod. Stick us
together and we were unstoppable; we would get the bad guys and laugh the
entire time.

“There’s
no point denying it,” Hal said, misinterpreting my non response. “I saw the
whole thing. I’ve noticed the way he looks at you. And I know what happened
during your first training session with him. Everyone does.”

“And?” I
sighed, leaning my head against the back of my chair and staring at the man
through slightly crossed eyes as I tried to see around my nose. Why couldn’t he
mind his own business and let me deal with Lester on my own?

“And you
shouldn’t have to take it. It’s harassment.”

I rolled
my eyes back for a brief look at the ceiling, willing myself not to let anymore
tears spill on Rangeman premises today. Between Lester’s continued hatred and
Hal’s obvious concern, I was ready to break, but I’d already taken one
afternoon off this week to calm down from Merry Man induced hysteria, I
couldn’t afford another.

“I’m
serious, Kit,” Hal insisted, moving closer so he could gaze down at me to make
eye contact. “I’ve known Lester a while; he’s a great friend of mine, but the
way he’s treating you is not okay. You need to report him.”

Blinking
in shock, I sat upright so fast I nearly flung myself on the floor. “I can’t,”
I told Hal adamantly.

“You
have to,” he said calmly.

I shook
my head, this time in fervent disagreement. “No. I- I...” No way could I file a
harassment complaint against Lester. There was a desolate war zone separating
us from the easy friendship we used to have now, I could only imagine how much
worse things would be if I followed Hal’s suggestion.

“No
other workplace would stand for this, Kit,” he informed me. “And Rangeman won’t
either. Harassment of any kind is just not on.”

“Of
course, he will!” Hal practically exclaimed. “That’s the whole point! He needs
to be taken to task!”

“What
will happen to Lester?” I questioned, more worried about the man I’d hurt in so
many varied ways than my own wellbeing at this point. I’d caused enough damage
to last a life time; I wasn’t about to add to it by complaining to the powers
that be – Ranger – that he was being mean and unfair. It felt like dobbing, and
I was not a dibber-dobber.

“Hard to
say,” Hal shrugged, leaning against the desk near me. “We’ve never had a
situation like this before. He’ll probably be subjected to... a hearing...” The
way he paused, hesitating while he chose his words, made it clear that what he
really meant was mat time; the infamous Rangeman punishment for all things big
and small. I cringed at the very thought. “Possible a suspension period.”

Yeah, mandatory time off to heal from his
beating, I thought.

“I won’t
do it,” I said firmly, spinning my chair to face the computer once more.
Subject closed. I couldn’t bear the thought of Lester being injured because he
had strong feelings and issues regarding me and everything I’d done to him.

“If you
won’t, I will,” he assured me, standing to leave. “I’m away for the weekend,
but if I come back and find that no complaints have been filed, I’ll take care
of it myself.”

His tone said that the chances of him just
filling in a form on my behalf were slim. Probably, raised voices and fists
would be involved. It seemed that either way, Lester was going to get the shit
kicked out of him for things that, deep down, are my fault anyway.

Hal was
almost out of the cubicle, allowing me to wallow in my self pity alone, when he
turned back and, in a completely chipper tone that belied the conversation we’d
just had, asked, “Are you still good for babysitting tomorrow?”

“Yeah,”
I said numbly, almost too weak to speak. The mood swings around here, coupled
with my own emotional rollercoaster, were exhausting the hell out of me. “Nine
o’clock, right?”

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